Beachwatch: With offshore winds and clear blue skies it’s going to be a fabulous spring day beachside although there’ll be very little action for the surfer. The wind will be north-west to west with the swell from the north-east at a struggling half to one metre. Wave conditions will be clean but like yesterday most beaches will hardly break on the morning high tide. Around town try North Stockton, the Cowrie Hole, Newcastle, The Cliff, Dudley and Redhead. Further south try Hams, North Catho, Frazer Park and Soldiers. At Port Stephens try Samurai and One Mile. All beaches will be good for a swim and don’t forget to slop on the sunscreen. The water temperature is 17 degrees.

Hunter headlines

A five-year-old boy is in hospital after a crash that killed three men at Timor, near Scone, on Monday. Read more.

IT was just hours following the accident, and Clayton Curnow was being released by police after being charged with being drunk behind the wheel of a utility when his best mate, Jake Collins, fell from the roof and died. The phone rang, and it was Jake’s devastated mother, Paula Southern, on the other end. Read more.

PLANS for a palatial eight-bedroom holiday home to be built over two blocks at Trinity Point will be lodged with Lake Macquarie City Council shortly. Read more.

THE Baird government says it will “work with” Newcastle City Council on the rezoning of the former heavy rail corridor, but has dodged questions about the timing of the key transport plan that Lord Mayor Nuatali Nelmes says is needed before the plan can progress. Read more.

LOADS of fingerlings are in transit to their home for the next 13 to 14 months in sea pens off Hawks Nest. Read more.

JACK Duncan arrived at the Jets in June as a back-up to Ben Kennedy. Now the ambitious gloveman has the chance to cement himself as the club’s long-term No.1. Read more.

DAVID LOWE: It was a good day at the office for the Jets, wasn't it? Read more.

State of the nation

Need a national news snapshot first thing - well, we have you covered.

► TAMWORTH: A family has been torn apart after a double shooting in a quiet, suburban East Tamworth home left a mother and father dead. More here.

John and Rainee Abberfield, pictured here on their wedding day, were found dead inside their Bailey Ave home in East Tamworth on Sunday night. Photo: Supplied

► TIMOR: Three people are dead and a five-year-old boy has been found alive after a car drove off a cliff in Timor near Scone, the Wespac Rescue Helicopter says. More here.

► WAGGA: Riverina Catholic priest Father Neru Leuea has been acquitted of raping a 10-year-old girl more than a decade ago, but a shadow still hangs over his future, with District Court judge Gordon Lerve describing the priest as a “particularly unimpressive witness who gave a number of unresponsive answers”. More here.

Father Neru Leuea about to enter court with his solicitor, Simon MacKenzie. Picture: Les Smith

► YEOVAL: A Parkes carpenter has modestly said he was just doing what anyone would when he stopped and pulled two people out of a burning vehicle at Yeoval on Saturday. More here.

Travis Boland was back in Parkes on Monday just two days after he pulled a father and son from their burning vehicle. Photo: CHRISTINE SPEELMAN

► COODANUP: A homeowner has been left shattered and irate after finding her once-pristine home with smashed windows, torn out ceiling fans and dog excrement all over the floor. More here.

Windows were left smashed at the Coodanup home. Photo: supplied.

► TASMANIA: The Legislative Council this week is set to demand refinement to the government’s plan to lower the school starting age when the new Education Act bill is debated. More here.

► WODONGA: Up to 2000 jobs would be lost across the region if the Murray-Darling Basin Plan is fully implemented in its current form. A report, commissioned by the Goulburn Murray Irrigation District’s water leadership forum, was released on Monday and also forecasts $4.4billion in annual production losses by 2020. More here.

► TASMANIA: The extreme stress of having to tell a family their loved one has been killed in a fatal car accident does not get any easier, veteran crash investigator Sergeant Nick Clark says. More here.

► BLACK HILL: A judge says it's disturbing a convicted Victorian rapist who attacked two teenagers a decade before he tied up a third teen and raped her in a Black Hill mine still claims he is innocent. More here.

National news

► Greens leader Richard Di Natale has called on Malcolm Turnbull to stand up to "right wing dinosaurs" and legalise marriage equality, saying Mr Turnbull will lose the next election if he doesn't. More here.

► Amnesty International's new report, Island of Despair, outlines a series of allegations about life on Nauru for refugees and asylum seekers. The human rights group says it interviewed more than 50 refugees and asylum seekers, most of who have "disturbing, detailed accounts of the disintegration of their own or others' mental health". More here.

An aerial picture of Nauru, where Australia houses hundreds of refugees and asylum seekers.

► Pauline Hanson says she is emboldened by the growing support for One Nation as it prepares to field candidates at the Western Australia and Queensland elections, arguing the party continues to confront issues the major parties won't touch. More here.

Pauline Hanson says One Nation is surging because she has been 'listening to people for a long time'. Photo: Alex Ellinghausen

► Attorney-General George Brandis says confidential material has "never, ever" been communicated by cabinet ministers on WhatsApp - but he won't be releasing the proof. More here.

Attorney-General Senator George Brandis (right) checks his phone during the Senate budget estimates hearing with PM&C officials at Parliament House on Monday. Photo: Andrew Meares

National weather radar

International news

► More than 300 vials of performance and image enhancing drugs have been seized during a search at a Kenwick home. A 37-year-old man will be summonsed to appear in court after the Australian Border Force intercepted a package from China before finding the vials among other contraband during the search. More here.

Vials of performance and image enhancing drugs, found in a seize in Kenwick. Photo: Supplied

► BALI: A "nervous" Sara Connor told Bali prosecutors she was innocent before being transferred to the infamous Kerobokan jail to await the murder trial of police officer Wayan Sudarsa. More here.

Sara Connor being moved from her cell at Denpasar police station ahead of her transfer to Kerobokan jail on Monday. Photo: Amilia Rosa

► JAKARTA: A sign warning cables had snapped on a rickety suspension bridge connecting two islands off Bali was erected four days before it collapsed on Sunday night, killing eight people. More here.

On this day

The faces of Australia: Bill Sweetenham

Mount Isa's Bill Sweetenham during his days as Great Britain's head swimming coach.

In October 2011, Mount Isa was humbled by the return of one of its most famous sporting identities – Bill Sweetenham, former swimming head coach for Australia, Britain, Spain and now Argentina. Over a weekend Bill ran a world-class swim clinic covering all four strokes, starts and turns, with information sessions. Every athlete walked away with a wealth of knowledge, honoured they had learnt from the best, who was one of their own. Read more here.